La Matanza, barrio y limpieza.

La Matanza neighborhood and cleanup. 

Below are the minutes from the Community Development Committee Meeting held on September 13, 2010

COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE

MEETING (CDC)

DATE September 13 2010

VENUE Christ Devine Church KB

TIME 2.30 PM

Introduction

Community Development Committee (CDC) is an initiative of an organization called Concern World.It facilitated the formation of a fifteen member committee in all the villages in Korogocho.Each village committee was mandated to select and prioritize issues in their areas for a common action.

They were encouraged to source out for any technical and financial support on their own and were advised to be meeting once per months to deliberate on their issues.

All villages in their prioritized issues indicated education as one of the key areas of their focus and in fact to majority of them this was the starting point in their mid term goals. The CDC committee of KA through CONCERN invited committee members from other villages to come and share ideas on how they are tackling the education issue. They had identified ACORN Kenya Trust as a potential partner to work with and were to facilitate the forum whose main agenda was campaigns on education.

The process

The meeting started at 2.30pm with a word of prayer said by one of the CDC members from KA.

Mr. Kairu who is also the Chairman of that area made an opening remark and took members through the agenda of the day which was ‘education campaign’.

He also welcomed Mr.Owino the area chief who was present in the meeting to give his remarks. The chief assured all the members present of his knowledge about the meeting however, he informed the participants that he will not be for the discussion because he was handling some other visitors in the office. He also informed participants that Madam Chief could not attend the meeting as she was recapturing from an operation of a broken limb in the hospital. He encouraged members of Korogocho to continue with such meetings meant for development and officially declared the forum open before leaving together with RC Chairman who was also mourning the death of his Sisters’ child.

Attendance

• All villages had sent more than eight representatives with the exception of Gragon A which had two representatives and Gragon B that had no single representatives.
• CONCIRN representatives confirmed their attendance but would come late.
• Two community organizers from ACORN Kenya Trust were in attendance.

ACORN Kenya Trust

It was prudent for the organization to introduce itself as way of levelling of as a facilitator of the forum.

David Musungu took members through a brief profile of the organization.

ACORN is an Association of Community organization for Reforms Now. It is a new model of organizing adapted from America. It organizes community in the low and middle income areas for social, economic and political empowerment. The organization was founded in America forty three years ago by its chief organizer Mr.Wade Rathke and currently has branches in other counties like Canada, Peru, Argentina, Dominican Republic, India and now in Kenya where rolled out its programmes in 2009 in the two villages of Highridge and Kisumu Ndogo.

Myriad of issues were identified through caucuses, meetings and other dialoguing forums. Some of these were,

• Insecurity
• Environmental issues
• Water and sanitation
• Extreme poverty
• Health
• Education
• Youth issues
• Women issues

However education, health and sanitation were prioritized in that order.

ACORN intends to carry out campaigns on these issues’

Education campaign strategy of Acorn

Sammy Ndirangu took members through this item.

Education as an issue was given a priority as it is interrelated to all other issues highlighted above.

There is a big gap between the transitions from primary school and secondary school. About 10% of students who sit for the primary education examination are able to make it to the next level but the rest who constitutes the lager number no one who knows what happens to them. Others who make it to the secondary school end up dropping out of the school before even sitting for their form exams due to inability to meet the school fees and other basic requirements.

As all this happens, there are funds from the government devolved kitty in form of bursary fund which is supposed to assist these poor families for their children to access secondary education and tertiary collages such as CDF, LASDAP and ministry of education bursary fund. Very few pupils’ from Korogocho if any who have been able to benefit from the kitty and members of the community claims that this has not been in a smooth way. There are claims that the few who get it had do bribe or get it after a long and tedious process. The Question of where the rest of the funds go remains still a mystery to many of the residents.

Mr. Sammy said that Korogocho as a community has a right to these monies and its accountability.

The availability of a polytechnic in the area was also questionable. Majority of members do not know of its existence.

The government in it budget of 2009-2010 made a commitment to support these institutions. Students within these institutions are also being offered in form of bursary an average kshs.15, 000 per year for their training. Very few of community members know about this information which is critical for their own development.

It is in this line that Acorn Kenya is launching its campaign on matters of Education in the area. However ACORN Kenya can not win this campaign alone, the two villages of Highridge and Kisumu Ndogo can never win this campaign alone. It requires a concerted effort from all of Korogocho residents and other actors working in the area of education.

To succeed more facts are required, like the number of students not going to school, the number of those in school but can not access the funds and the real cases of studies of parents and guardians who have straggled to access the bursary fund but in vein.

Challenges

Members of the CDC were convinced that education was indeed a thorny issue in Korogocho and needed to journey together as a community to campaign and streamline the sector.

Peoples mind were however destructed when;

• A few members from the committee of Kisumu Ndogo engaged in petty issues within their ACORN committee.
• Same members did not understand the level of involvement of ACORN in the whole process of CDC.
• Other members claimed to have been given a different agenda on their invitation.
• Still others were expecting for some payments of money from CONCERN.

These led to some members matching out in protest.

Way forward

It was agreed that ACORN approaches individual CDC from every village and agree on how and when to convene for village level meetings first. This will then culminate to an area wide meeting for the same campaigns.

This idea was supported by the members of CONCERN who came in later and who also promised to do the follow-up as to why these CDC leaders behaved in this manner.

The meeting ended with a word of prayer at 4.20pm.

Minutes compiled by CO Acorn –Kenya

Cc. to Cos Redeemed Church

Cc. to the area Chief Mr. Owino

Watch:

16 December 2010 Last updated at 05:12 ET

India’s micro-finance suicide epidemic
By Soutik Biswas

In his grotty, two-room brick home, all that remains of Ketadi Ramchandra Moorthy is a laminated colour photograph sitting on the cold cement floor. 

Two months ago, the 40-year-old carpenter dropped dead after a heart attack at a bus station in Hyderabad, some 70km (43 miles) away from his rural home in the south-east Indian state of Andhra Pradesh.

He had travelled to the city to beg friends for cash to pay loans he had taken over the course of a year from private micro-credit firms.

A broken man, he had been heading back empty-handed to Gajwel village in Medak district.

A government report said Mr Moorthy had suffered a heart attack “due to pressure put by the micro-finance institutions for repayment”.

“He was so stressed out that he just collapsed and died,” says his wife, K Karuna, 36. 

More than a third of the 30 million households that have taken micro-credit in India live in Andhra Pradesh. The majority of the borrowers are women.

Borrowers’ revolt

But the small loan has turned out to be a big curse for many in the state.

More than 80 people have taken their own lives in the last few months after defaulting on micro-loans, according to the government.

This has triggered the worst ever crisis in India’s booming micro-finance industry.

Scenting votes, opposition politicians have encouraged borrowers to halt repayments – micro-finance companies have given out 80 million rupees ($2bn; £1.3bn) of loans in Andhra Pradesh.

Banks, in turn, have stopped lending to micro-finance companies and fear they may not recover some $4bn in loans.

“Multiple lending, over-indebtedness, coercive recovery practices and unseemly enrichment by promoters and senior executives [of micro-credit companies] has led to this situation,” says Vijay Mahajan, chairman of India’s Microfinance Institutions Network.

India’s micro-finance crisis mirrors the 2008 subprime mortgage meltdown in the US, where finance companies threw cheap and easy loans at homebuyers until prices crashed and borrowers were unable to sell their homes or pay their debts.

But the difference in India is that the borrowers are even poorer, with zero social security.

Mr Moorthy’s story is a tragic example of how micro-loans – annual interest rates vary from 24-30%, compared with the 36%-120% charged by usurious money lenders – can lead impoverished, ill-educated people to ruin.

This defeats the supposed purpose of micro-credit, with all its talk about improving the lives of the poor.

In 2002, Mr Moorthy took a loan worth $350 from a micro-credit company to build his $2,210 home.

Half of the money came via an interest-free loan his wife – who rolls tobacco leaves for a living – took from her employers.

A moneylender chipped in another loan worth $440 that is yet to be repaid.
Ultimate price

In May 2008, micro-credit salesmen descended in droves on Mr Moorthy’s village and he took a second loan worth $330 to pay off small debts to his neighbours.

This second loan, the family say, was paid off within a year.

Undeterred by the debt trap he was falling into, and persuaded by aggressive micro-credit agents, Mr Moorthy borrowed $660 in three loans from as many companies.

These were to pay for the education of his three children, including a college-going son, and, again, to repay previous debt.

When he died in October, he had been defaulting on the latter three loans for up to 20 weeks.

Mr Moorthy’s annual earnings, say his family, usually never exceeded $110.

“Loans have been given to rural people without checking whether they had the capacity to repay,” says Reddy Subrahmanyam, the state’s most senior rural development official.

The government estimates families that have taken micro-loans in Andhra Pradesh have an average debt of $660, and an average annual income of $1,060.

This means more than 60% of their fragile, uncertain income is being spent paying off loans.

Two months after his death, Mr Moorthy’s family struggles to survive, pawning jewellery and depending on the generosity of caring neighbours and vote-seeking politicians.

The eldest son, K Ramanachari has had to give up the college education that cost his father so much.

The 19-year-old has found a job ferrying tobacco leaves on baskets once a week, earning about 100 rupees ($2.2) for a day’s work.

Mrs Karuna rolls tobacco leaves during the day and then, if she is lucky, finds farmwork in the evenings.

All this fetches her less than $3 on a good day.

She pawned her silver and gold jewellery, worth nearly $200, to keep a roof over her children’s heads and send them to school.
Appendicitis to suicide

Two leading politicians, including the state’s main opposition leader Chandrababu Naidu, have lent her $1,100, which she plans to deposit in a bank.

“Big or small, loans kill. I will never take up another loan,” says Mrs Karuna.

Sometimes a loan taken to save a life can end up taking a life in the debt-stricken villages of Andhra Pradesh.

Mylaram Kallava, 45, hanged herself from the ceiling of her mud hut in the neighbouring village of Ghanapur after she defaulted on four micro-loans amounting to $840.

The loans were taken to pay for medical treatment for her 17-year-old daughter’s appendicitis and her eldest daughter’s pregnancy, which ended in a miscarriage.

The nearest government hospitals were more than 70km (45 miles) away, forcing Mrs Kallava to seek private treatment which was well beyond her means.

The three loans were taken in July last year – Mrs Kallava was in default for just two months when she killed herself.

It did not help that her grave-digger husband, Narsimhulu, 55, was in poor health and found work only now and then.

The federal jobs-for-work programme in the village stopped in August, leading to an acute shortage of employment in the area, locals say.

“I could feel that my mother’s tension was building up when she began defaulting,” says her daughter, Sangeeta. “She was unable to get work.

“Her co-guarantors in the group came to the house and asked her to explain. I think she felt ashamed.”

For seven days before she took her life one weekday evening, Mrs Kallava had been unable to find any work.

The micro-loan recovery agents were due to come knocking by the end of that week.

She did not wait for them.

This is the first in a two-part series by Soutik Biswas on the micro-credit industry in India.

BBC © MMX The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites.

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NOTE FROM COI WEB TEAM: We will post the second in the series when it is posted by the BBC.

Tuesday, 7 December 2010

PRESS NOTE

New Delhi, December 7, 2010

‘The Coalition against Exclusion and Violations caused by the Commonwealth Games’ organised a public meeting and media consultation with the communities affected by the Commonwealth Games (CWG). The coalition also released a charter of demands to Members of Parliament, Members of the Legislative Assembly, and the media.

‘The Coalition against Exclusion and Violations caused by the Commonwealth Games’ consists of a number of organisations, civil society groups, and social movements that have been working on the human rights impacts of the CWG. Although the members work in diverse areas and have opposed the Games for different reasons, they unanimously condemn the large-scale human rights violations in the city, the financial irregularities inherent in the CWG process, and the continued lack of redressal for the grievances of the poor and marginalised citizens of Delhi.

Members from affected communities spoke about a range of human rights violations that they have had to face due to the CWG. These include:
* The forced eviction and displacement of approximately 250,000 people for the Games, including in the ‘beautification’, ‘cleaning’ and ‘security’ drives in Delhi.

* The arrests, detention and forced removal of ‘beggars’ and homeless citizens from Delhi for the duration of the Games. The Bombay Prevention of Begging Act 1959 was used to arrest and detain ‘beggars’ as well as gainfully employed homeless citizens. Several people were threatened to leave Delhi and forcefully sent back to their homes.

* The violation of the rights of construction workers, most of them migrants, who were denied adequate wages and safe working and living conditions. In many instances even children were made to work at the sites.

* The eviction of domestic workers, drivers, plumbers, and other informal sector workers and labour groups.

* The trafficking of women and young girls from other states for CWG visitors and participants.

* The loss of livelihoods for over 300,000 street vendors (according to the National Association of Street Vendors of India – NASVI). Cart-pullers, vegetable sellers, waste-pickers, balloon sellers, cobblers, street-food vendors and others were prevented from working on the streets, and thus denied their right to work and livelihood. Many of them were forced into starvation since they had no money to buy food. Eateries and weekly markets were also forcibly shut down. (Estimation from various sources put the figure at a daily income loss of Rs.10,70,00,000 (10 crore and 70 lakh rupees) for the above-mentioned groups)

* The diversion of Rs. 678.91 crore for Scheduled Castes in Delhi from the Special Component Plan to cover CWG-related costs. This was in violation of the 2006 Planning Commission Guidelines.

The socio-economic middle class of Delhi has also been affected by the Commonwealth Games. Apart from the inconveniences and restrictions imposed on them during the Games, they will also have to pay for the huge economic deficit of the Games for many years.

Dharam Halder from Bengali Camp highlighted the manner in which evictions had been carried out and stressed the fact that no compensation had been paid to them. “There is no one for us poor people. The government threw us out and the media has also abandoned us. We trust no one.” Sri Ram, who was displaced from Prabhu Market, Lodi Road, said, “Not only have we been robbed of our houses but attempts have been made to reduce our lives to nothingness. We are not allowed to sell vegetables and other wares on the road and face constant harassment from the police. How do we earn our living and feed our children?”

Sakkoo Bai, a woman from the Motia Khan shelter who had been evicted from the Rachna Golchakkar night shelter spoke about the suffering they faced due to the CWG. They were forced to stop working during the Games and had to rely on civil society support to survive. Mansur Khan from Beghar Mazdoor Sangharsh Samiti highlighted the plight of homeless citizens, many of whom faced forceful expulsion from Delhi during the Games.

The Charter released by the Coalition against Exclusion and Violations caused by the Commonwealth Games makes several demands, including calling on the government to oblige with its legal commitments and to ensure justice for the affected communities.

The concerned authorities need to urgently:
* Ensure that the ongoing investigations by multiple agencies, including the Shunglu Committee, the Central Bureau of Investigation, the Enforcement

* Directorate, the Central Vigilance Commission, and the Comptroller and Auditor General of India, include human rights violations in their ambit;

* Provide just and adequate compensation for livelihoods and homes lost due to the Games;

* Provide adequate rehabilitation, including housing and basic services, for all displaced families;

* Improve living conditions in resettlement sites, according to international human rights standards;

* Provide a moratorium on the proposed eviction of 44 listed JJ clusters;

* Ensure payment of adequate wages and benefits to all construction workers;

* Formulate a comprehensive post-Games legacy plan based on principles of social justice, equity and environmental sustainability;

* Investigate all concerned public officials for the misappropriation of public funds and corruption charges;

* Return funds diverted from the Special Component Plan in a manner best suited to the community, as also reiterated by Home Minister Mr. P. Chidambaram in the Rajya Sabha; and,

* Ensure that guilty officials are prosecuted according to the law.

The following organisations are members of ‘The Coalition against Exclusion and Violations caused by the Commonwealth Games’ and support the communities in their demands:
Indo-Global Social Service Society
Jhuggi Jhopdi Ekta Manch
Hazards Centre
Housing and Land Rights Network
National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights
Praxis

For more details, contact: Indu Prakash: 99113 62925, Dunu Roy: 9910687627 Dinesh: 8800731751, Mansur Khan: 92119 79454; Paul Divakar: 99100 46813; Shivani Chaudhry: 9818 205 234; Sowmyaa: 95606 59595

——————————————————————————————————————————————————-
A CHARTER OF DEMANDS OF COMMUNITIES AFFECTED BY THE COMMONWEALTH GAMES

The Coalition against Exclusions and Violations caused by the Commonwealth Games1 (CWG), presents this charter of demands on behalf of communities affected by the CWG.

India hosted the Commonwealth Games 2010 from 3rd to 14th October 2010 in New Delhi despite scathing criticism and embarrassing evidence of misappropriation of funds and human rights violations exposed by the media and researchers. What overshadows the ostensible successful accomplishment of hosting the mega sports event is arguably the issue of violation of citizenship and human rights and social justice that has been the direct consequence of the Commonwealth Games. In the name of security and in order to ‘beautify’ the city for the Games, thousands of citizens were denied their fundamental rights of freedom of movement, adequate housing, food, and of engaging in trade and occupations of their choice. Street vendors and rickshaw pullers were barred from carrying on their businesses, weekly markets were not permitted, roadside shops and jhuggis (slums/temporary shelters) were demolished, homeless citizens and beggars were arrested and forcefully removed from the city, and construction workers were denied wages and adequate living conditions and forcefully sent back home. The significant issue that emerges is that these rights were selectively denied to certain sections of society.

Members of the Coalition against Exclusions and Violations caused by the Commonwealth Games work closely with several of the above-mentioned groups and present below a charter of demands, which emerged from discussions with them.

1. Immediate and Just Compensation to:
a. Construction workers on all CWG sites;
b. Rehabilitation and adequate compensation to slum dwellers who were evicted during the Commonwealth Games, and moratorium on eviction of the 44 listed JJ clusters;
c. Daily wage labourers, homeless citizens, ‘beggars’, and other informal sector workers who were not permitted to carry out business in the run-up to as well as during the CWG.

2. A clear legacy plan for the CWG, which explains how the well-being of the citizens will be ensured, how the infrastructure created for the Games will be equitably used, and how benefits will be distributed to disadvantaged and marginalised groups.

3. Immediate return of Rs. 678.91 crore diverted from the Special Component Plan (Scheduled Caste Sub Plan) for the purpose of Commonwealth Games by the end of the financial year 2010-11.
a. SCP fund should be kept aside before allocating to the line departments / ministries.
b. Entire SCP fund should be spent on programmes directly benefiting individuals, families and hamlets. Programmes related to education and employment should be focused on individuals and families, and civic amenities related programmes should be focused on hamlets.

4. All investigation agencies must include human rights violations in the ambit of their enquiry. The investigations should also probe all relevant senior government officials.

5. The perpetrators of these crimes must be identified and suitable action must be taken against the guilty, in accordance with the law.

1 The Coalition comprises representatives and partners of Housing and Land Rights Network, Indo Global Social Service Society, Jhuggi Jhopadi Ekta Manch, National Campaign for Dalit Human Rights, Hazards Centre and Praxis (as secretariat of Social Equity Watch)

======================

To link to this article and get a PDF of the Charter of Demands, visit the South Asia Citizens Web at
http://www.sacw.net/spip.php?page=imprimer&id_article=1732

From MSN news:

New Delhi, Dec 7 (PTI) A coalition of civil society groups today demanded “justice” for victims of alleged large- scale human rights violations” of rickshaw pullers, street vendors and pavement dwellers during the Commonwealth Games.

The demands include immediate compensation to construction workers who had worked at the Games venues and daily wage earners who were not allowed to do business during the time as well as rehabilitation of those evicted from their homes.

The ”Coalition against Exclusion and Violations caused by the Commonwealth Games” by Social Equity Watch has released a community charter to counter “continued lack of redressal” of the grievances of the marginalised arising out of the preparations for the mega-event.

“Corruption is one major aspect, but alongwith corruption accountability of the government to the welfare of the people which has been violated…,” Paul Divakar of National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR) said on the charter”s purpose.

The return of Rs 678.91 crore diverted from the Special Component Plan (Scheduled Caste Sub Plan) for CWG by the government by end of this year has also been demanded.

A third demand is the probe of human rights violations in inquiries being conducted into the Games by investigating agencies.

Narrating his experience during the its release, Bhuvan Das, a hawker who resided in Bengali camp, claimed families in the area were given only an hour”s notice before the demolition of the clusters began as part of preparations.

Sri Ram, who was displaced from Prabhu Market near Lodhi Road, alleged “harassment” by the police and claimed he still has not got permission to start selling his wares as a street vendor there. “Nobody”s listening to us,” he claimed.

The 19th Commonwealth Games were held in the national capital from October 3 to 14.

Press Trust Of India
New Delhi, November 26, 2010

==============

The Central Vigilance Commission (CVC), probing alleged financial bungling in the Commonwealth Games-related projects, has referred certain cases to the Enforcement Directorate to check whether there was violation of foreign exchange laws. Official sources said that projects like construction of Commonwealth Games Village near Akshardham temple and flyovers, hiring and procurement of medical and fitness equipment and conduct of outdoor publicity campaign by the Organising Committee may come under the ED scanner.

They said a decision to hand over cases to ED for a “logical conclusion” was taken recently during a meeting Central Vigilance Commissioner P J Thomas had with senior officials.

Sources said the Chief Technical Examination (CTE) wing of the Commission, which has scrutinised all the documents related to bidding and grant of tender worth crore of rupees to various firms, has found substantive evidence that these private companies might have routed money through illegal means and bypassing laws.

They said the Chief Vigilance Officers (CVOs) of government agencies like Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC), Public Works Department (PWD) and Delhi Development Authority (DDA) have been specifically directed to pursue all matters related to violation of Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) with the ED.

A CVC team has seized documents from the Games OC office here to avoid any tampering of evidence. “There has been some cases where the Commission has noticed alleged violations of forex laws.

We will be giving those cases to ED for interrogation and report,”a CVC official said requesting anonymity. Sources in the anti-corruption watchdog said that the officials working in its “special cell” – exclusively made to deal with cases of Games corruption – will meet ED officials early next month in this regard.

Press Trust Of India / New Delhi/ Chandigarh November 19, 2010, 0:42 IST
===========================
The ruling Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) in Punjab today said it will launch a ‘mass awareness campaign’ to mobilise people against what the party termed as unprecedented scams involving the bigwigs of the Congress-led UPA at the Centre.

A resolution to this effect was passed at the party’s Core Committee meeting here, a SAD spokesman said here today.

Describing the 2-G spectrum scam allegedly involving the UPA big shots as “mother of all scams” the committee said its magnitude along with that of Commonwealth Games and Adarsh Housing Society scandals had shocked the world and lowered the country’s image abroad.

The movement would also aim to educate masses on the conspiracy of the rich corporate world to defame the pro-poor and social welfare policies of the Punjab government in order to perpetuate their exploitation of the poor, the spokesman said.

The Core Committee lashed out at the opponents of pro-poor policies of the Punjab government, especially those aimed at providing help and relief to the deprived sections of society through the desperately needed subsidies.

“Those opposing the subsidies are backed by the rich tycoons of the corporate world who wanted to exploit the poor masses and swell their coffers through unethical means. The party is proud of the SAD-BJP government’s clear and firm stance on subsidies,” said the resolution.

A resolution passed at two-and-half-hour meeting of the Core Committee declared that the party would “fully expose the Centre resorting to hypocritical means to confuse the people on the issue of debt-waiver to Punjab.”

“The Centre is still refusing to categorically state whether an offer to waive Rs 35000 crore out of the total debt was ever made to Punjab but was instead resorting diversionary replies,” the resolution said.

The committee fully endorsed the continuance of subsidies being given by the Punjab government to farmers, pensioners, dalits and other poor and deprived segments of society in rural and urban areas.